


After Mars

by Pigeon_theoneandonly



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Mass Effect 3, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-10
Updated: 2019-10-10
Packaged: 2020-12-07 18:53:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20980715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pigeon_theoneandonly/pseuds/Pigeon_theoneandonly
Summary: At the end of the world, people sometimes look for comfort in unlikely places.  A quick little spicy AU assuming Kaidan was not severely injured at the end of the Mars mission in ME3.





	After Mars

Hackett signed off and let them go. Shepard sagged, for a long moment letting the day’s heaviness show in the hunch of her shoulders, the way the railing running the perimeter of the comm room took her weight and her boot scuffled at the floor.

“We’ll be at the Citadel in a few hours,” Kaidan said. She started; in her soul-deep exhaustion, she’d forgotten he was there. “You’ll talk to the Council. We haven’t seen the last of Earth yet.”

She bit back a reply, knowing as well as she knew her own name that the Council wouldn’t help. They never came through, not once in almost four years. She passed her hand over her mouth. “Yeah.”

There was nothing in the world she wanted more than a hot shower and a quick nap before she had to somehow compose herself enough to speak before the Council. Assuming she could sleep. But even if not, just the chance to rest her eyes would be welcome.

So, of course, Kaidan followed her out of the comm room and all the way into the elevator, rambling. He did that sometimes, fill two words’ worth of conversation with a few dozen, when he got upset or nervous. “This is different. This is a threat to the entire galaxy, not something they can sweep under the rug. They’ll listen. They have to.”

Her experience with the Council was they did as they damn well pleased. “If you say so.”

The complete lack of inflection in her voice didn’t escape him. 

“Hey,” he said, softer, a tone she recognized all too well. One meant to reassure her. And sure enough, he reached for her arm, intending comfort.

Shepard flinched away from his touch. Her face gone quite cold. “You don’t get to do that anymore.”

“I wasn’t doing anything.”

“You don’t get to snap at me while I’m getting shot at, and disbelieve my every word for the last goddamn year, and then act like— like—” She blew out a breath. “I don’t want anything from you.”

“Okay.” Disconcerted, and not a little hurt. Part of her took some satisfaction in that. It was about time he shared in some of the pain he’d caused. “But we still have to figure this out. What to do next, what to say to the Council.”

The elevator arrived at Deck 1, and opened onto the small atrium before her cabin. Shepard walked forward as though he wasn’t even there. 

And because he’d never been able to take the most glaring of hints, he trotted after her, all the way to her desk. “Shepard, we have to form some kind of strategy. If we can’t win them over—”

“Then Earth dies.” She stripped off her gauntlet, too overwhelmed by the invasion and Cerberus’ unexpected appearance on Mars, and too frustrated with his persistence, to curb her tongue. “Bam. Kapowie. That’s it, roll credits, it’s the end of the human race. Just enough time for everyone else to pull out the popcorn and cheer our demise before the reapers come for them, too.”

A flash of irritation at last. “This isn’t funny.”

“No, I think it’s downright hilarious.” The other glove joined it on the table, and she started working at her shoulder armor. “Over three years to prepare and our illustrious leaders squander it for a little political capital, as if it’ll buy their lives when the reapers reach the Citadel. Goddamn it.”

The strap was caught on something. She yanked at it, too angry to sort it out or even see it properly, until a gentle grip drew her hands back. 

“Here,” Kaidan said. “Let me get it. The buckle’s just in backwards.”

Shepard stood so still she shook the slightest bit as he worked, his head ducked down and focused on the task at hand. Her mouth pressed into a thin line. Heat rose off his body, close enough to feel on her face, and with it came his scent, soap and sweat and musk. The last time they stood this close was on Horizon. And before that… before that…

Her shoulder armor came loose. He set it aside, and looked up at her. “There. All better.”

His breath caught as he realized she was barely inches from him. His eyes uncertain, wandering over her face, a question in their depths.

It settled on her with all the weight of a feather. But with everything else, that small, final inconsolability collapsed all her careful distance. This was too much. It all was too much.

Shepard grasped after the only solace in reach, brushed her fingers over his cheek and tangled back into his hair, and drew his mouth to hers.

His arms slid around her immediately, instinctive, hungry hands roaming her back. She let out a little involuntary sigh. His lips trailed across her jaw and down to her neck as she began, without any conscious thought whatsoever, to loosen his armor. Fingers feeling their way around buckles and clamps and straps, certain of nothing except that she needed this, an urgent antidote to the horrors on Earth and the long lonely year behind them. 

He had the same thought, sliding off her other shoulder piece, loosening her chest armor and letting it fall to the floor. Pulling back just far enough to unzip her elastomere suit and pull it free to her waist before meeting her again in a famished kiss. Then it was her turn, pulling the final layer, the flimsy undersuit, clear of her head and leaving her bare to his touch. Not caring or even noticing as the rough texture of his armor rubbed her red.

Her fingers finally figured out the buckle blind and his utility belt fell away, followed by the composite plates covering his thighs. He lifted her onto the edge of the desk. Shepard reached back and shoved every object on it over the edge, terminal, datapads, paper folders and mission logs and comm pod, all clattering to the ground. Groaning as his gloves vanished and his bare fingers touched her skin with a shiver of raw heat. Pulling at her own leg armor now, eager to have it gone.

Kaidan moaned into her mouth as her leg brushed his crotch. Modern spacesuits used elastic pressure in lieu of air, and she couldn’t imagine having an erection under all that was any fun at all. Her hands found the suit closure at the back of his neck, eager to relieve him of it. 

He wriggled to help her as soon as he realized her plan, suit and undersuit catching at his knees on his remaining plating. He let out a growl of frustration and bent to remove it, only to have Shepard yank him upright and press her mouth to his, over and over.

“Forget it,” she hissed, between each frantic kiss. One arm holding him tight to her, and her other hand reaching between them and confirming her suspicions. 

His eyes squeezed shut as she ran her hand up his shaft in one firm stroke. “Shepard—”

“Shut up.” She nipped his earlobe, a warning, and felt him throb in her grip. “If you ruin this now, I’ll kill you.”

He pushed her on her back, hard enough to surprise her, and grabbed her by the waist. Yanking at the remainder of her suit, her raising herself up to help. She felt as much as heard a strap break as he stripped her shin armor to free her entirely. Nothing in the world mattered less. Then he was laying down over her, Shepard yanking at his undersuit shirt, urgent to feel his bare chest against hers. His mouth trailing down her chest as she pulled it over his head, tongue on her nipple as the collar finally cleared. Shepard let out a strangled gasp. His hands tightened on her waist. Dragging her hips to the desk’s edge.

His hard dick brushed her inner thigh with a flash of hot lightning, flaring into an urgent need. Her arms wrapped his chest and forced him back to her, face to face, and she left a sucking kiss on his neck. Legs wrapping his hips, tight to his ass, making her wishes plain.

He was in no mood to argue. One hand left her, just for the merest instant, reaching between them to position himself, then gripping her breast hard on pure animal instinct as he thrust fully inside her. She cried out at the unexpected roughness of it; he never got rough, not with her, but in this moment it was exactly right. His mouth swallowed her shout, wet and frantic and forceful, as they began to move together. His thrusts hard and barely keeping any kind of rhythm, trying, it seemed, to merge into her completely. Her legs urging him even faster, matching him stroke for stroke, pushing her pelvis up into his. The last remnant of her suit had caught on her right foot and banged tonelessly against the desk.

She tangled her fingers in his hair. Her other hand gripped his ass, so hard she was certain he’d bruise. Heat rising in her. Her head tilted back. “Kaidan—”

His mouth moved to her neck. Exactly the spot she liked. Her eyes squeezed shut. “Don’t— I can’t—”

But he knew that part of her, too, and didn’t slow or let up an iota. The physicality of it, the magnitude of sensation running up and down her nerves, his fat cock inside her, his hand tightening on her breast, his breath on her skin, grew overwhelming. Her voice went up the scale. Her thighs began to shake. “Kaidan, oh god, Kaidan, I can’t—”

Just when she thought she truly couldn’t stand it a second longer without some kind of reprieve, her back arced. A long, strangled, wordless cry left her mouth, legs vise-tight around him, forcing him as deep as he could go. He let out an enormous groan into her neck and she felt his own release, pulsing, a final burst of scorching heat. 

They collapsed into each other. His weight abruptly settling and puddling on top of her as his muscles relaxed, so familiar, too much so. Her fingers just now letting go his hair. He’d once complained, jokingly, that it was thinning due to the strength of her grip. She turned her face into the side of his head, breaths coming deep and slowing now. Cuddling into him without a second thought.

His hand trailed up her body and cupped her cheek. More tender than she had any right to expect. And just for that second, when he couldn’t see her expression, her eyes shut and she let herself enjoy it. Despite the fighting and distrust and just plain cruelty that sex couldn’t begin to fix. This small and fleeting comfort worth a moment’s denial.

Kaidan pulled back, enough that they could look at each other. As confused as she felt, a lock of hair flopping into his eyes.

She smoothed it back. This hadn’t solved a damn thing. At best, it just added another complication. But Kaidan always took things seriously.

Then they both jumped out of their skins as the intercom activated. Liara. “Shepard, I’ve found the device schematics. You’ll want to look at this.”

Shepard stared up into Kaidan’s face. “Sure. I’ll be right down.”

“Is Kaidan with you?”

A burst of laughter escaped before she managed to clamp her mouth shut. Kaidan’s face lowered onto her shoulder, his whole body shaking. His dick still flaccid inside her. 

She opened her mouth, let out another chuckle, composed herself and tried again. “Yeah. We were just… talking strategy.”

“He’ll want to see this, too.” If Liara detected anything amiss, it didn’t show in her voice.

“Roger that.” She glanced over at him.

He lifted his head. Still laughing, if a bit helplessly. Impulsively, she pushed upward and brushed his lips with a brief kiss. “Duty never ends. We can’t talk about this now.”

“No.” Reluctantly, he levered himself off her, Shepard feeling a moment’s piercing emptiness as he slipped out. Kaidan glanced around her cabin. “You know, I just realized.”

She swung her legs over the side of the desk, working to free the suit from her foot. “What?”

“I don’t have any clothes on this ship.”

And somehow, the completely baffled expression on his face made her forget, just for an instant, everything that was happening beyond this cabin. Just enough relief to keep going another day. “Get in the shower. We’ll find you something.”


End file.
